Claim control applicatio
utomation of travel expenses would be a welcome application of AI, but robots aren’t taking over just yet
Automa By MARK FRARY
is coming to get you.That is what a report from consulting firm PwC would have us believe. The com-
pany’s March 2017 UK Economic Outlook forecast that 30 per cent of jobs in the UK, many of them office roles, could be at risk from automation in the next 15 years. PwC’s chief economist ohn Hawk- sworth said at the time: “No industry is entirely immune from future advances in robotics and AI.”
is c
you.That is what consulting firm have us believe UK Econ
forecast that 30 per cent of jo many of them office roles, co from automation in the ne PwC’s chief economist J sworth said at the time: “N entirely immune from futu in robotics and AI.”
It’s not entirely bad news. “ more manual and repetiti eliminate some existing jo uld also enable som
focus on higher value, more r creative work, removing th from o
owhere is this autom
to be more keenly felt tha of expense claims, regular employees’ number one h
t’s not entirely bad news. Automating more manual and repetitive tasks will eliminate some existing jobs,” he said. “But it could also enable some workers to focus on higher value, more rewarding and creative work, removing the monotony from our day jobs.”
Nowhere is this automation going to be more keenly felt than in the area of expense claims, regularly named as employees’ number one hassle. In fact,
AI cannot come soon enough for some business travellers. Chris Baker, managing director of UK enterprise at Concur, says: “We see AI as the next fundamental leap in technology; companies across the travel space and beyond are hard at work developing and furthering AI. “Although we are not quite at the stage of being able to offer ‘true AI’ yet, we’re seeing a lot of machine-learning systems being built into chatbots, scheduling tools and financial analysis; a trend that is only set to continue picking up pace.” At the heart of Concur’s approach is the idea of a perfect trip, says Baker, “one that is seamless, connected and of benefit for the traveller, travel manager and company”. “This is what has led us to develop not just an expense report that writes itself, but an entire connected ecosystem of applications that automatically feeds back information into Concur, allowing companies to capture booking and spend information really easily.”
The company is currently adopting a combined approach of augmenting human brain power and machine- learning. “Ultimately, the point of using these systems is to speed up processes for those in travel and finance, rather than give them a complex tool to learn how to run and analyse,” says Baker. But, he says, at this moment in time, no matter how intelligent a system being used is, it cannot be a substitute for human intuition and analysis – man and machine need to work side by side. “Fundamentally, what AI and machine-learning bring to the table is the heavy lifting. As with any kind of automation, these systems are able to analyse great swathes of data that would take a team of employees weeks to sift through, in a matter of minutes.”
Bob Neveu, president of Certify, which recently merged with Nexonia, Expense- Watch and Tallie in a US$125 million deal, says that while many companies claim
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